Researching the history of film requires locating sources relevant to telling you what happened at the time of the film’s release and also how we understand the film at different periods of time since then.
In this exercise, you will learn how to locate primary sources and secondary sources. You will also learn how to use those sources for your research. In a later guide, you will use those sources for writing an analysis of a film.
In the following sections, I use the 1928 American film The Crowd, directed by King Vidor.
Primary sources tell us about the period of time when the film was released. In this video, I define primary sources and explain how to find some for The Crowd (1928).
These are the links I reference in the video:
Secondary sources tell us about how others have written or thought about a film, either currently or in the many years since its release. In this video, I define secondary sources and explain how to find some for The Crowd (1928).
These are the links I reference in the video:
In this video, I explain what to do with the sources that you located.
These are the links I reference in the video: